Paul de Gelder continues to swim with sharks to learn more about them. Agencies

Nutan Sheriff, Features Writer

‘Shark week,’ television’s longest-running, and most anticipated summer event returns with bigger sharks and bigger breaches on August 16. SHARK WEEK 2020’s jaw-dropping lineup delivered incredible shark stories and celebrate the 20th anniversary of ‘Air Jaws’.

Discovery Channel continues to work with nearly two dozen of the world’s most respected marine biologists and science institutions to bring brand-new, innovative shark research technology and compelling insight on some of the most unique shark species in the world. SHARK WEEK 2020 takes viewers to New Zealand, Australia and South Africa to see how the global lockdown and reduced amount of human activity on the seas has given sharks the opportunity to reclaim the oceans.

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Shark attack survivor Paul De Gelder shares his knowledge on sharks and what his experiences has taught him

Do you find it therapeutic to swim with the sharks?  How does swimming with them help you get through your past experience?

Paul de Gelder: Absolutely.  Any chance I can get to swim with sharks I’ll take that, because every time, it’s a different eye-opening experience.  I’m just a big animal lover and so I obviously love adventure as well.  And I think that going into the ocean is the closest experience that any of us are going to have to going to space because, you have to go on to this breathing system, you’re going to a realm that’s not your own and then you’re surrounded by all of these little alien creatures.  And so it’s always a journey of discovery that like in the early days, confronting the sharks and learning to dive with them. Then learning to hand feed a bull shark in CG, you know, the shark that changed my life, really helped me get over my pre-conception of sharks being vicious man-eaters.  But now, I just love doing it.  I’m pretty good, I don’t really have anything I need to get over anymore.

I can imagine.  And knowing that you have a long experience and knowledge about sharks is there also anything or multiple things that you’ve recently learned about them?  And how did you use this new knowledge and contributed to Discovery?

Paul de Gelder: Yeah, yeah.  For one of the shows called, The Great White Double Trouble, we discovered — well, it was known but I discovered that there’s two separate populations of Great White sharks in Australia.  And then you think, you know, coming from Australia, I might know this knowledge but not many people do and so I get to share that knowledge with sharks.  We looked at the statistics between which population of those sharks are most dangerous to Australians in the water.  I’ve got to learn about a new material that could potentially stop people dying from shark attacks and I got to learn that Mike Tyson throws up when he’s scared.

Yeah, that’s a nice fact.  Fun fact.  And any tips to swimmers on how to behave when they see a shark?

Paul de Gelder: You don’t want to panic.  I know it goes against all natural instincts but you want to remain calm and you want to keep your eyes on the shark.  You don’t want to turn away from it and swim away too quickly because then it will turn into its predatory mode and probably try and chase you down as prey.  So you want to stay calm, keep your eyes on it.  If it does approach you, you don’t punch it, because if you meet an animal with aggression, it will meet you with aggression.  So you just want to put your hand on the top of its head and just push it away and that will show that you also are a dominant predator, you’re not food, and the shark should look somewhere else.

Okay.  Great tips. And this is specifically a question for the Middle East, have you been to Dubai Aquarium or Atlantis Water Park and are you planning to do anything in Dubai since it’s encouraging environmental experiences?Paul de Gelder: I have passed through Dubai a long time ago and my dad was working in Abu Dhabi, and so I passed through Dubai.  I don’ have any plans to go there, I don’t think anyone has any plan to go anywhere at the moment, but yeah, I would love to go and see it and experience it.  I hear wonderful things.  I hear it’s enormous.